An Introduction to Ecclesiology

Historical, Global, and Interreligious Perspectives

Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen

• Publisher: IVP Academic
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780830841905
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Systematic Theology & Ethics

What is the church? Why are there so many different expressions of church throughout time and space, and what ties them all together?Ecclesiology—the doctrine of the church—has risen to the center of theological interest in recent decades. In this text, theologian Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen provides a wide-ranging survey of the rich field of ecclesiology in the midst of rapid developments and new horizons. Drawing on Kärkkäinen's international experience and comprehensive research on the church, this revised and expanded edition is thoroughly updated to incorporate recent literature and trends. This unique primer not only orients readers to biblical, historical, and contemporary ecclesiologies but also highlights contextual and global perspectives and includes an entirely new section on interfaith comparative theology. An Introduction to Ecclesiology surveys- major theological traditions, including Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Reformed, and Pentecostal- ecclesiological insights from Latin American, Africa, and Asia- distinct perspectives from women, African Americans, and recent trends in the United States- key elements of the church such as mission, governance, worship, and sacraments- interreligious comparison with Jewish, Islamic, Hindu, and Buddhist communitiesAs the church today encounters challenges and opportunities related to rapid growth in the Majority World, new congregational forms, ecumenical movements, interfaith relations, and more, Christians need a robust ecclesiology that makes room for both unity and diversity. In An Introduction to Ecclesiology students, pastors, and laypeople will find an essential resource for understanding how the church can live out its calling as Christ's community on earth.

ORIENTATION TO PART ONE

Biblical, Historical, and Theological
Roots of the Christian Community

BIBLICAL SYMBOLS, METAPHORS, AND INTIMATIONS

Numerous metaphors and symbols of the church in the New Testament have deep roots in the Old Testament narrative of the nature, life, and experiences of the people of Israel.1 The following three have gained particular importance in Christian parlance: the people of God (1 Pet 2:9; Rev 5:9-10), the body of Christ (Eph 1:22-23; 1 Cor 12:27; Col 1:18), and the temple of the Spirit (Eph 2:19-22; 1 Pet 2:5). Speaking from the later perspective of the fully developed trinitarian doctrine, one can easily see here a triadic pattern. Indeed, ecumenically it is noteworthy that virtually all Christian churches are currently in agreement regarding the trinitarian basis and nature of the church and the anchoring of communion (koinonia) in the shared divine life itself.

Let us take a closer look at the meaning and significance of these three defining biblical metaphors of the Christian community.

Church as the temple of the Spirit. In the Bible, the Spirit not only works in one’s personal life but also has a community-forming role, as is clearly evident on the day of Pentecost, at the founding of the church (Acts 2). This is not to contend that Pentecost in itself is the “birthday” of the church—which is rather Easter because without the raising of the crucified Messiah, the church would not have emerged—but to highlight the importance of the Spirit, along with the Son, as the dual foundation of the Christian community. Everywhere the Son works, the Spirit is there as well, and vice versa.

The importance to the church of the Spirit of God has been appreciated particularly in the Christian East (the Orthodox tradition). Whereas ecclesiologies of the Christian West (Roman Catholic, Anglican, and Protestant, as well as Free Churches and independent communities) are predominantly built on christological categories, the Eastern doctrine of the church seeks a balance between Christology and pneumatology. Eastern theologians often speak of the church as the body of Christ and the fullness of the Holy Spirit.2

As the Spirit-ed community, the church is charismatically endowed and empowered to accomplish its mission.3 The Spirit also guides and shapes the life of the community, themes to be developed in detail below.

Church as the body of Christ. In Pauline theology, the body terminology abounds. Whereas in 1 Corinthians and Romans body refers to the individual community, in Ephesians and Colossians it refers to the whole church. The body metaphor for individual communities has to do with interrelated virtues and qualities of love, unity, and working for the common good (1 Cor 12–14). In relation to the whole church, at the fore is a cosmological Christology working out eternal purposes toward the reconciliation of all peoples and all of creation.

Early in Christian tradition, the body metaphor (in reference to the whole church) began to be developed in primarily institutional and hierarchic terms. This development reached its zenith in medieval Catholic ecclesiology and subsequently. Unfortunately, it led to the implicit identification of the church with Christ, a mistake to be corrected (in the next section).

A proper and balanced ecclesiology is determined by the whole history of Jesus the Christ, beginning from his earthly life with teachings and miraculous acts and works; continuing with the pronouncement of forgiveness and inclusion of even “outsiders”; all the way to his suffering, cross, and death; and culminating in his glorious resurrection, ascension, the Pentecost pouring out of the Spirit, and finally his current cosmic rule. With this kind of wide and comprehensive grounding, the church’s mission can be framed in a dynamic and multilayered manner.

Church as the people of God. Peoplehood is understandably based on divine election, a concept that has roots of course in the election of the people of Israel in the Old Testament (Gen 12:1-3). Divine election means both particularity and opening to the world. On the one hand, the chosen community has a unique relationship to God, notwithstanding the lack of superiority over other nations (Deut 7:7-9). On the other hand, on account of its election, it has a missionary mandate to help other nations to know God (Is 2:2-4; Mic 4:1-5).

Whereas in the theology of the early church the concept of the people of God played a significant role, it receded into the background subsequently, particularly with the entrance of Christendom and Christianity’s official status as the civic religion. Fortunately, the peoplehood of the church has been rediscovered, first in the Reformation and then more recently in the Catholic Church’s Vatican II theology of the church as the people of God.4 Conceiving the church as the pilgrim people on the way to their destiny, Vatican II’s profound ecclesiological document Lumen Gentium (The Dogmatic Constitution of the Church) further highlights the eschatological, future-driven nature of God’s community.5

“People of God” is the most comprehensive among the three main metaphors. It not only means everything that the church denotes, but it also highlights the inclusiveness and equality of all Christians and, importantly, includes Israel, the first people of God. The church-Israel relationship will be carefully investigated in part four (chapter eighteen).

CHURCH, COMMUNION, AND THE KINGDOM

Church communion rooted in trinitarian communion. As mentioned, the common threefold, biblically based description of the Christian community as people, body, and temple reflects its trinitarian nature. No wonder then that, beginning from the early centuries, the Christian community has been conceived in trinitarian terms. This is still a living tradition, particularly in the Eastern (Orthodox) Church, and currently has an ecumenical consensus.

Just as each person is made according to the image of the Trinity (Gen 1:26-27), so the church as a whole is God’s image. The triune God is the eternal communion of Father, Son, and Spirit. The church as communion is anchored in this same God, whom it reflects, albeit incompletely and often in a broken manner.

This understanding is expressed with the help of an important New Testament term: koinōnia. Its many meanings include a number of interrelated, dynamic meanings that make it ideal to describe the relationship between God and the church as well as relationships among the churches:

• fellowship with the triune God (1 Cor 1:9; 2 Cor 13:13; 1 Jn 1:3, 6)
• sharing in faith and the gospel (Rom 15:27; 1 Cor 9:23; 1 Jn 1:3, 7)
• sharing in the Eucharist (Acts 2:42; 1 Cor 10:16)
• participation in (co)sufferings (Phil 3:10; Heb 10:33)
• partnering in common ministry (2 Cor 8:23; Philem 17)
• sharing in and contributing to communal and financial needs (Acts 2:44; Rom 15:26; 2 Cor 12:13; 1 Tim 6:18)6

Church and the kingdom of God. The whole ministry and proclamation of Jesus Christ centered on the coming of the righteous rule of his Father in the power of the Holy Spirit, the kingdom of God (Mk 1:15; cf. Mt 4:17; Lk 4:43-44). It had already arrived in his teaching, healings, exorcisms, and pronouncing of forgiveness, culminating in the glorious resurrection from death on behalf of the world. But the kingdom still awaits its final consummation. Between these two comings of Christ is the era of the church. Therefore, the church is referred to the future of God, the eschatological consummation. In the words of Miroslav Volf, the New Testament “authors portray the church, which emerged after Christ’s resurrection and the sending of the Spirit, as the anticipation of the eschatological gathering of the entire people of God.”7 Every gathering of the church refers to the final homecoming (Rev 21:1-4).

The coming of the kingdom of God is not only the consummation of men and women, but their salvation. The scope of the church’s anticipation is even wider and more comprehensive. Concurrent with the coming of God’s kingdom will be the consummation of God’s eternal plans regarding the whole cosmos.

Hence, it can be said that the church serves as the sign of the coming reign of God. The church in itself is not to be equated with God’s rule. God’s reign, his kingdom, is much wider than the church or even human society. The church is a preceding sign pointing to the coming righteous rule of God in the eschaton.

The distinction between the sign and the thing sets the church and its function in relation to God’s rule in its proper place: “A sign points beyond itself to the thing signified. It is thus essential to the function of the sign that we should distinguish them,”8 or else we repeat what happened when Christendom essentially equated the church and God’s kingdom.

Acknowledging the anticipatory nature of the church’s existence helps avoid uncritical alignment with any political or ideological order. As Barth put it succinctly, “Christians will always be Christians first, and only then members of a specific culture or state or class or the like.”9

ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC, AND APOSTOLIC: THE MARKS OF THE CHURCH

A cherished ancient way of describing the nature and goal of the church is to speak of the four “marks”: one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. This expression even found its way into the ancient Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed (381 CE).

Importantly, unlike too often in later tradition, these four classical marks of the church (also called notes or signs in tradition)—unity, holiness, catholicity, and apostolicity—were not first used in any apologetic sense. The marks were most probably added to the creed somewhat haphazardly. Rather than abstract definitions of the church, the marks were first and foremost objects of faith or “statements of hope.” Eventually, they have also become “statements of action,” because they urge us to realize what is believed and hoped for.10

It is usual and useful to consider the marks as both gifts and tasks. Indeed, the twofold sense has already been implied above. On the one hand, they are gifts from God. We do not make the church one, holy, catholic, and apostolic; only God can. On the other hand, we see only too clearly that any church in the world, including our own, is far from those markers. Hence, each description is also a matter of hope, which leads to action to more closely attain their realization.

To underline the dynamic and missional orientation of the marks, the leading American Reformed mission theologian Charles Van Engen points in the right direction by calling them adverbs. Rather than static adjectives, the adverbial conception calls for the church to be “the unifying...